O.k. i have always wanted to attend a black college. I have gotten excepted into eveyone that I applied to. I'm very close to transfer to one but the one thing that is preventing me from making a final choice, besides saving a little more money attending a state school again next year, is that Im a dark skinned sista.Im so afraid about going to the south because I have heard from many people about how different darker skinned people are treated, especially by other blacks. Im from NY, and don't get me wrong, there is hella decrimination against darker skinned people, especailly sistas, but I have been told that its much worse down in the south. This may sound really trivial but this has been on my mind for the longest. My whole life I've heard, "you cute to be a dark skinned girl!" or "you a pretty BLACK girl!", Im used to it by now. I know that I am an attractive person and don't get it twisted, I get major play.....but I know that if I was lighter skinned I would get so much more attention and I wouldn't here uneducated comments. I have been to several places in the south because most of my family is from Alabama, Georgia or LA but I have never lived there for more that 2 months. My question is for all the people who had lived, live or spend a good amount of time in the south, how serious is the skin complexion issue there? Do I really have anything to woory about?Am I being to dramatic about whole thing?
I think you are being a little too dramatic! Its not tht serious. The whole dark skinned vs. light skinned thing is played out. Thats something folks talked about in highschool. What matters in the south is that you have decent manners and you are not too arrogant.
Down here (SC) I get more my physique than my color. Every once and a while I hear "hey red bone". I am not a red bone but I have a red tint to my brown skin. It doesn't bother me when they say it. I can't change my skin color, you can't either. As long as you know who you are its all good. No one will come at you wrong, though. If so, just let them know who you are and keep stepping. The skin color issue isn't that serious where I am.
It is a northern thing, sister. You have to remember that many of the Blacks up north have never set foot in the south, remember how it was 30, 50, or 60 years ago and suffer from serious jungle fever. Light up there equals white, as in white woman or man. The tide is turning on which states harbor color stricken Black folk, and the north is rising in its prejudicial ways. Comments regarding skin color and hair texture were heard in Minnesota on a daily basis, but I do not hear that crap down here in TX. Yeah, like someone else mentioned some of our elders still hold to that mentality, but the 40 something and under crowd is not feeling it.
Someone else stated everyone gets blacker anyway upon arriving down south anyway, and I like my new skin tone and hope to get darker.
Just be you, and let what is inside shine through not matter the color of your skin, cuz your inner beauty is what men really are after even though we do not act like it.
